Lindsay is a Sales Manager with ReachLocal and has been with the company for over 7 years. She loves the fast-paced, ever-changing world of digital advertising and has a diverse background in the full digital space. She enjoys showing clients how to make data-driven decisions about what is working and what isn't as well as trouble-shooting campaigns and coming up with solutions.

Online marketing is necessary. Word of mouth isn’t dead, but it’s morphed into “word of mouse and keyboard.” There are common trends between bad online marketing habits and lack of ROI. Below are the most common offenders. Bad Habit #1: “I’ll Do It Myself to Save Money” Many local business owners believe running their own online marketing campaigns can help them save money. But, the reality is that online marketing is extremely complex and time-consuming. Because you are an expert in running…

As a business owner, you know that you have to have a presence on Facebook. But, what type of presence should you have? How often should you post? What should you post? What is this “boost my post” button? Facebook is subtly telling you to run ads, but is it worth it? You have 295 likes on your page but it’s saying you only reached 75 people with your last post, why? Let’s explore the reasons an organic + paid strategy may…

This is the last part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. Knowing your ROI is incredibly important. If you don’t know which marketing efforts are driving ROI for your business, you’re more likely to make uninformed decisions that may cost you big time. Making decisions based on data rather than thoughts, feelings, and emotions can help you drive even more ROI for your business. In order to know what marketing is working for your business, you have to understand your…

This is the seventh part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. We are living in a “mobile-first” world right now, which means every aspect of your digital marketing needs to be configured for mobile devices – including your PPC campaigns. You have to have a mobile-friendly website, mobile-friendly landing pages, and an optimized PPC campaign for mobile searchers. Is Your Website & Landing Page Mobile Friendly? If you’re not sure whether or not your website or landing pages are mobile-friendly,…

This is the sixth part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. In my opinion, optimization is the most important element that will help your PPC campaign (closely followed by determining your PPC budget). It’s important to have a strategy to optimize your campaign so you know your budget is being spent correctly and getting you the right leads. Here are some questions to answer to help you optimize your PPC campaign: What search engine is converting best?: Google and Bing…

This is the fifth part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. Budget is clearly an important element of your PPC campaign. Your budget is not determined by what you want to spend on PPC, it’s determined by what you have to spend on PPC. If you go in with the mindset of “I’ll spend what I’m okay with losing,” then you will never win. A budget is derived from a math equation, there’s no rabbit or magic hat. There are four…

This is the fourth part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. Your landing page can make or break the success of your PPC campaign. A great landing page can entice a lead to take the next step and actually become your customer. Consider these tips for creating good landing pages: 1. Tailor Your Landing Pages Your landing page must be relevant to the keywords you are bidding on. If you offer multiple products or services, then you need a landing…

This is the third part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. Text ads are an extremely important element of your PPC campaign. Your text ads serve as your gatekeeper to keep out the searchers you don’t want and attract the searchers you do want. Consider these three tips for creating compelling text ads: 1. Balance Your Text Ads The key to a successful text ad is a balance of relevant keywords and a call to action. Don’t try to cram…

This is the second part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. When running a PPC campaign, you need to consider which locations you’re going to target in order to be successful. Here are four tips for determining locations to target: 1. Identify Where You Conduct Business Do you go to your customers or do they come to you? If you go to your customers, how far can you travel until your ROI starts to drop off? If customers come…

This is the first part of our eight-part series on mastering PPC. Running a PPC campaign can be extremely rewarding but equally intimidating. It’s necessary to increase ROI, grow, and stay competitive in your market. But, you don’t want to jump into pay per click without identifying a strategy. We’ve identified eight important elements of a successful PPC campaign that we’ll be sharing in an eight-part series. The first part of our series is about focus keywords because the first step…